Dim-witted proposal for daylight time

By Alex Beam, Globe Columnist  |  July 26, 2005

Ed Markey is such a silly-billy. If he didn't exist, someone would have to invent him.

Back in April, our Seventh District congressman issued a press release announcing his cosponsorship of a daylight savings bill ''to shorten the winter, lengthen the summer, and save energy." Claiming his legislation would ''bring on the spring" -- funny, I thought someone else did that -- he added that ''daylight savings just brings a smile to everybody's faces."

Yes, it sure does. Before I critique the ''thinking" backstopping Markey's proposal to add eight weeks of DST to the calendar, let's examine the smiling faces that have failed to line up behind this untimely flight of lunacy:

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops opposes Markey's bill because it presents ''a great danger to the schoolchildren who will be forced to travel to school during the pre-dawn darkness."

The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism has written a letter pointing out that some Jewish prayers cannot be recited before sunrise. Under DST, the Sequel, that could come as late as 8:45 in some parts of the United States, when many are already at work. Echoing arguments made by at least two other Jewish groups, the USCJ director of public policy, Mark Waldman, told The Washington Post that he did not believe the legislation intentionally levied this hardship, but that it was something he wished the committee had considered.

The Calendaring and Scheduling Consortium, whose members include software giants Oracle and Yahoo!, as well as universities like MIT, Stanford, and Berkeley, wants to delay implementation of DST, the Long Version, until it can figure out whether or not the broadened time change will wreak havoc with the calendars embedded in the nation's computers.

The Edison Electric Institute, which represents 200 private utilities, is lobbying against the bill because it might throw electric metering systems out of whack.

In a public letter last week, James May, the president of the Air Transport Association, said US airlines stood to lose $147 million annually because of disruption to the schedules caused by DST-Extended Play.

It gets worse; there is plenty of opposition in Canada, the tail wagged by the big US economic dog. Prime Minister Paul Martin's spokesman opined last week: ''While most people -- excepting vampires -- favor more daylight, there are serious issues of concern to the aviation and other industries."

So . . . Catholics, Jews, nerds, utilities, airlines, the National Parent-Teachers Association, farmers, and Canadians all oppose the bill. Who's for it?

Good question! Markey supports it because he claims it will save 100,000 barrels of oil a day, reduce crime (!), lower traffic fatalities (!!), and increase economic activity. The energy-savings claims for DST, Part Deux, have been likened to cheating at Solitaire, or cutting an inch from the top of a blanket and adding it to the bottom, to make the blanket longer. In other words, maybe fewer lights are on, but people are consuming energy in other ways.

Markey's office notes that the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association (hoping to sell more badminton nets?), the National Association of Convenience Stores (sell more Slurpees?), and the Retinitis Pigmentosa Foundation Fighting Blindness (thinking there will be ''less" twilight) have lined up behind his proposal. In an interview, the congressman points out that the United States added an hour of DST in 1986. ''You don't hear any complaints today, but back then we had pretty much the same people saying how disruptive it would be."

Last week, the House and Senate energy bill conferees scaled back DST-XXL from eight weeks to four weeks. Instead of being implemented in November, it would become law in March 2007. If the Department of Energy can't find any energy savings, ''The Congress retains the right to revert the Daylight Saving Time back to the 2005 time schedules once the Department of Energy study is complete."

Markey remains sanguine about the prospects for DST-II. ''A whole lot of people love the deep dark, dismal, dank days of winter," he says of his opponents. ''They want to see it extended."

I hate winter. But I'm not sure changing the hands on the clock is going to make it go away.

Alex Beam is a Globe columnist. His e-dress is beam@globe.com.